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Peace on Earth! Hold that thought.

“Do not rejoice when your enemies fall, and do not let your heart be glad when they stumble. ~ Proverbs 24:17

“In the Shambhala [Buddhist] warrior tradition, we say you should only have to kill an enemy once every thousand years.” ~ Chogyam Trungpa

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We Americans must all remember: when we pray for revenge, or war, or victory, we inadvertently pray for other things, too.

While our celebrations in America, last night, have been joyous, and bipartisan, and have not vilified Muslims (thank God), there is still the shadow of an uncomfortable visual parallel to those images that fill us with so much fear and hate: young men in Iran, etc., celebrating by burning our flag, chanting Death to America.

Death is not sport.

And so while I’m grateful Osama is gone—his absence gives me hope for peace, for safety of innocents civilians—I do not know that we should indulge in the satisfaction of sated hatred.

That said…

“I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.”~ Mark Twain

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1627223 Responseshttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.elephantjournal.com%2F2011%2F05%2Feditors-letter-let-this-historic-moment-be-about-peace-on-earth-for-all-not-a-celebration-of-revenge%2Feditor%27s+letter%3A+Let+this+historic+moment+be+about+Peace+on+Earth+for+all%2C+not+a+Celebration+of+Revenge.2011-05-02+22%3A45%3A17Waylon+Lewishttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.elephantjournal.com%2F%3Fp%3D162722 to “editor’s letter: Let this historic moment be about Peace on Earth for all, not a Celebration of Revenge.”

waylon, clicking through from your dalai lama article i imagined you might use trungpa's quotes about "idiot compassion" – i think a lot of people who tried to righteously invoke buddhist ideas of compassion as a response to these events may well have been engaging in the fallacy trungpa points out so clearly.http://www.shambhala.org/teachers/pema/qa5.php